second term. the immigration, sequestration, immigration. there are a lot of issues he could address today. and he's going to have to. joining me is nbc kristen welker at the white house. alex wagner. chris freight, national correspondent for the national journal. and jackie kucinich, political editor for "the washington post." i want to star with kristen right now, it seems to me this is going to be dominated by syria. >> i think that's right, chris. i think that the president is going to get a lot of questions about syria. of course, several months ago he declared that it would be a red line if syria used chemical weapons. just last week, the administration said that there is proof, they believe, that syria has used chemical weapons. and at this point, it's not clear how the president, how this administration is going to respond. they say they need more evidence to corroborate the initial intelligence reports. i think you're absolutely right, the president has to some extent

boxed himself in with those comments. we know that he's also reached tout russia. he just made a phone call to vladimir putin yesterday trying to get him on board to convince assad to step down, at the very least, relinquish his campaign against his own people. i think, chris, you're going to also hear questions about the sequester, as you know. congress just passed a bill. it took them two days to pass bill to cut off the part of the sequester to end furloughs of air traffic controllers basically ending those flight delays. but what they didn't address are the other issue of the sequester which include cuts to head start programs and other federal programs across the country. i think you're also going to hear some questions about the tsarnaev brothers, the brothers suspected behind the attacks in boston. and what type of help have they gotten from russia in terms of getting to the bottom of that. a whole host of issues but i think you're absolutely right, syria will be topic number one. >> alex, it seems that the

president may have put himself verbally in a box. a new poll, 52% of the american people say stay out of syria. >> the yeah, the american people is not on the side of the intervention. the question is whether this becomes air intervention. we know air power is where assad has the most power. it would be a way for the u.s. to intervene quote/unquote without putting boots on the ground for the most support. there's the legacy of rwanda and the clinton era. there's the idea that president obama is a quote/unquote moral man and this is amoral leader that needs to be stopped. 70,000 people have been killed. there was a car bombing in damascus that killed 13. the bloodshed in syria, the american people may not want us to do anything over there, but in tellers of what it represents, standing idly by is not part of our fabric. in that way, the president is in a very tough position.

>> jonathan, do you believe with that, i think the country is war weary. i think the country doesn't accept the fact that we have airplanes, for example, flying over damascus possibly being shot down. using drone, it's always an easy way out and an expensive way out. your thoughts? >> totally agree. no, i absolutely agree. the country looks very differently at drone use overseas. something that i believe most folks see as a detached sort of, for them, at least, bloodless way of going about, particularly u.s. foreign policy, putting boots on the ground in a foreign country. i think there's very little appetite among the country at large for another military intervention. in a foreign country that involves sorts of active presence of troops on the ground. >> let me get -- chris freights on his question which we're learning about, mr. clapper, the director of national

intelligence is looks into the failure of our intelligence community to work together with regard to tracking these two brothers and their mother, perhaps the wife of the older brother. we don't know who is involved at this point. certain no confession coming yet from the younger brother. but the questions here, what did the russians know? what did they tell us? did we act on that? did they act on what we had? we're hearing about a conversation between the older brother and the mother that sounded pretty jihadist. and the question is how far should have conversations have gone? >> that's right, christian, what we're hearing from congress along these conversations are we seeing what they're calling the stove piping eck. they're keeping this silent so the fbi isn't sharing it with the cia, isn't sharing it with the department of homeland security. there are certainly, i think, going to be hearings when congress returns next week, what did these intelligence agencies

know. what did they hear from the russians. how did they flag it. how did they proceed. certainly, janet napolitano has told us they were flagged when they left the country. however, was pinged when he returned. and the question is, well, did the russian authorities -- when did they let us know about this conversation that he had with his mother that they picked up on, after he returned, before he returned? that's going to be difficult to know. these are really important questions that some of these congressional leaders are going to want answers to because it's the lessons learned about the boston bombing. and we're starting to see that part of the story take shape. look for that to happen next week. >> i think, chris, as well, we're in the mystery part of this story. nobody is going to move on until we know how this happened. let me go to jackie on this. jackie kucinich at the "post" about this, the sequester, the way this is played, certainly, by the democrats to show how

cruel it can be. my question, it's a tough one pour the president if i were to get at him today, what exactly is your offer to the republicans that you think they might accept to get around the sequester? are you really going to push for higher taxes? are you going to push for these other programs they really don't believe in? what are you going to cut the deal? i think it's on the president's docket right now to come up with something. >> well, yeah, i think you've heard a lot of that being pushed on congress. having the president act first, the faa issue is anomaly in the way that congress had to fix it because the public was reacting to it. aspect that today and from congress next week. to readdress this topic when they come back. and i think the pressure, you're right is going to be on the president to act. >> we're going to go around the table here a couple times because it turns out, this is always interesting, guys that press conference has been postponed a half hour which

means the president and his team weren't ready to go. which means they're working out some details and answers to the questions they know are coming. it's always interesting, it does add to the suspense, certainly. kristen, what do you make of the half-hour delay? >> well, look, i think you're probably right. they are probably going over the answers that they are anticipating here. and to your point about the sequester, one of the questions that he's going to have to answer is the fact that has he given away his leverage on this issue? how he essentially, by go back on his word -- remember, he initially said he wasn't going to accept a deal that cut off part of the sequester. in other words, he wanted to deal with the sequester in its entirety. so one of the tricky questions that he's going to have to address today is that, does he have any leverage left to get the rest of the sequester cut off, as you and jackie were just discussing. so it's those types of tricky questions that he is probably reviewing right now with his

staff. of course, we know this was called in a rather impromptu manner. the press didn't get a heads-up about this press conference until about an hour and a half ago. so it is possible that they are doing some last-minute preparations for questions as well. and trying to make sure that he is up to date on some of these dwha questions that he will undoubtedly be taking that will be difficult. >> on your beat, chris, i'm counting the days that he's had pressure. is that part of the pressure, you simply have to release that pressure on a fairly regular basis if you're the president? >> i think that's absolutely right, chris. we haven't heard from the president in this context, in a press briefing, since march 1st. i think the white house is keenly aware that there have been a lot of developments since then including syria. remember, we've heard from him really once on the topic of

syria. and he really gave a brief response to his question of whether or not a red line had been crossed. there really wasn't an opportunity for a strong back and forth. so i think that the white house knows that he's got to come forward on some of these pressing irs like syria, like the sequester, like the boston bombing and actually answer questions. remember, chris, he's going to be traveling at the end of this week. he's going to mexico and costa rica. so it is also quite possible that they want to put him in front of reporters before those trips to flesh out some of those issues that he's dealing with heren 0 the home front and abroad before he focuses his attention on mexico and costa rica. >> let me get back on the question of syria. i'm trying to weigh this out myself. i know the pressure on him because of the red line statement. i know this is the way we often get boxed in. with clinton back in the '90s. it was the iraqi liberation act. in terms of getting into war, they have to make good on them.

and get i have is how. i want to understand that the defense system in syria is excellent. and can stay the art, russian-built, so we have to go in somewhere almost diagonally the way the israelis are dropping the bombs, shooting from lebanon on this diagonal, if you will, which can go ten miles from where the airplane is. is that the way we would fight this, flying over and not flying around? >> i'm not a defense expert, chris. "a," is allows you to engage with quote/unquote, boots on the ground. >> what about planes in the air? >> i think to jonathan's point, there's a different consideration from the air and drones, it's a completely different ball of wax, chris. to the notion of the urgency around this, the thing we haven't talked about, in addition to the bloodshed, the refugee crisis.

you have 1 million refugees in lebanon. that number was 12,000 a year ago. 7,000 in jordan a year ago. now estimates to be 500,000. people are fleeing this country. it's become a regional concern. in so far as the president wants to have some kind of a coalition of living agency he did in libya, he wants to get the arab leaders involved. i would imagine he will be engaging them in there's a new peg in terms of our strategy on syria. >> you're hearing how complicated it is. we're having this conversation, think about what they're doing behind the scenes. the latest word is they're going to begin the press conference at 10:15 -- i'm hearing another voice. we'll be right back after this. [ female announcer ] now there's new neutrogena® naturals acne cleanser. acne medicine from the wintergreen leaf treats breakouts. no parabens or harsh sulfates. for naturally clear skin. [ female announcer ] neutrogena® naturals. that owns that aquarium store.

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we're waiting to hear from

the president, of course. he's going to take questions at this press conference. the first one actually in two months. it will be coming up in 15 minutes. big news. the director of national intelligence james clapper has now ordered a review of how intelligence was gathered on the boston bombing attacks. pete, thank you so much, what do were make about the dna story that's getting out about the female dna on the pressure cooker. >> well, it's pricing to many people that dna and fingerprints can survive the force of an explosion, both the heat and the physical force, but they can. and what we're told is some unidentified female dna was found on one of the pieces of the pressure cooker from one of the three bombs that they made. and they're anxious to try to figure out whose that is. now, they caution it could be a variety of people. it could be a victim at the bombings. it could be someone who handled a piece of the bomb before the scenes were secured.

it could be a store employee who handled it before it was given to the bombing suspects. but as they begin to work that through, they have taken a dna sample from the widow of the older of the two suspects, tamerlan tsarnaev. her name is catherine. she lives now -- she's staying with her parents in rhode island. and a team of agents visited the house yesterday, talked to her for a while. and left with some of her dna. so they will begin that process. you know, they emphasized that she's not a suspect at this point. but they do want to try to figure out where that came from. so that's one development here, chris. another is that we're told that the prosecutors and the lawyers for the young are suspect, dzhokhar tsarnaev, have begun very early discussions about a possible negotiated plea in which he would plead guilty, give the fbi a full the accounting of what happened and in turn, the government would not seek the death penalty. in a related note, the judge

yesterday granted a defense request to add an experienced death penalty lawyer to his team of public defenders. judy clarke of california. we heard her name before. you may remember she was the lead lawyer in the jared loughner in the other case. so it's certainly looking like a possible option here. >> this attorney who is an expert in capital cases tends to deal, is that right, negotiate? >> well, she's an opponent of the death penalty. and she often views her job as trying to find a way for these defendants to avoid capital punishment. now, this is a death-eligible case here because the charge that the younger tsarnaev is charged with, two counts, both of which carry a maximum sentence of death, and where death results. the government hasn't yet said that it would seek the death penalty. although i think it's a fair safe bet as this goes along,

they certainly would. >> is this shaping up in your eye as an all or nothing? in other words, for the lawyer -- the younger son obviously lawyered up with good attorneys. would the position of the defendant be all or nothing? i'm not talking at all. or you're getting it all? >> no, i think that -- well, i guess those are the two options here. you either plead not guilty and go to trial. or you try to find some way -- or you can still do that, and still after that point, still find some way to negotiate a plea. in many of these cases, chris, they do end up with a guilty plea to escape the death penalty. it's surprising how many of these cases end in guilty pleas. that's going to be -- there are two sides to that. but i think the government's interest would be to find out what happened here. and to get a full accounting from him. and if the only way to do that is to do it with a plea, then that's certainly tempts for the government to go down that road. >> the last question, as everybody has grown up with

perry mason, wants to know the answer. how do you know that he's completely given all the information? how does the government decide this young guy, 19-year-old, has basically given us the truth to save his life? >> well, there are two ways to do that. one is, as he makes statements, to check them out. to see whether investigation backs up what he says. some of it, to some extent, some of it is going to be unprovable. if he has an account specifically of when and how his older brother became radicalized, at some point, that's something that only the two of them would know. and one of them is gone. so some of those things will be difficult to tell. but in terms of sort of the key questions here, why did they choose that target. was anyone else involved? did they practice building the bombs? where did they build them? where did they get the supplies? how long beforehand did they detect this plot? how serious were they about going elsewhere, including to new york?

the circumstances of the carjacking. the shooting of the cambridge policeman. those are all things that have a physical aspect, a forensic aspect to me that can be verified. and i guess the other part, chris, is just the experience of interrogators, sort of the art of it, knowing they feel they have all that they're going to get. >> what a fascinating story this is going to be. by the way, every part you raised there, everybody wants the answer to. >> sure. >> thanks so much, pete williams, justice correspondent for nbc news. joining me now as before, kristen welker at the white house. alex wagner of host of "now." political reporter jonathan martin. chris frates, and jackie kucinich, political reporter for "the washington post." in the last few minutes we have here, the last ten minutes, the guns. they found 90% of the country was on one side of an issue for wider background checks.

it didn't really matter in our republic. what matters on capitol hill is intensity and longevity of an issue. and the pro-gun people won the fight. what do you think -- kristen, do you think the president is going to have to deal with this today? >> i think he certainly could get a question about this today, chris. specifically, in the context of what his second round is going to look like. remember, when he spoke out after the background check was voted down in the senate, he said, this is just round one. well, i have been talking to advisers behind the scenes and i have asked them what does round two look like. and so far, they haven't been able to map out a clear, definitive strategy. so it is possible he might get questions on that point. what specifically is he going to do moving forward to try to revive the background bill.

remember this weekend, senator joe manchin said he is not prepared to give up on the background check bill. he clearly has a sense that this could be viable, moving forward in the future. well, how specifically do they do that? how do they combat the gun lobby as you just mentioned seem to win this round. remember, chris, this all comes, we're just getting new polling numbers out, according to ppp, five senators have really lost standing in political polls because they voted against the background check, though. so that is possible that will add to the president's momentum, to the momentum of senator manchin and senator pat toomey who worked on this. >> actually, i looked at those same polls that kristen mentioned and i thought that's probably good for the gun safety people. you and i know that it's intensity that matters. people can tell a pollster something, but will they vote on this single irfor the rest of their life. whereas, a lot of gun people, that's how they vote.

>> you know, chris, vice president biden addressed that and said 85% of us that supported background checks are effectively are not going to go quietly in the night. and joe biden has been the poster boy for gun safety reform and to some degree you expect to hear those words but the fact that this is now released with a series of videos with women with assault weapons trying to prove the case that this is weaponry that belongs in the home. the fact that ted cruz came out yesterday and called those people, those people in his own party who supported gun safety reform squishes, that's a testament that they're a little more worried about this than they have been. usually, case closed. i saw joe manchin this weekend, he seemed as bullish as ever that he was going to get something done. that's a sign. and the opinion has shifted enough to make the nra scared. >> sometimes, i think that ted cruz uses the language of about

50 years ago. he's terms he comes up with, they sound like the mccarthy period, and now squishes sounds like high school, 1958. jonathan martin. j. mart, this whole question of guns i do think the president had the gun issue on his side and may have been a good issue for 2014? >> i tonight think harry reid is going to bring up another bill unless he knows he has the vote. he's not going to get embarrassed twice in his senate. the only time i think you could see it happen is in 2014, after the filing deadline comes and goes for a lot of gop candidates up that year. once they're assured they don't have primary opponents maybe they take a vote. but i think it's up linlikely t you're going to see guns brought back up again. >> what about the anger from the public oftentimes, the losing side of the issue gets its steam up more than the winning side?

>> look at heidi comments to my comments last week. the senator from north dakota who voted against the background check. she said the calls to her office were overwhelmingly against the background check bill. if that's the case, why would she change her vote? if people in her state -- again, it's intensity. if they're saying don't vote for this, she's not going to vote for it. >> intensity. let's remind ourselves a lot of people for gun safety are also for world peace, for jobs, for the environment. people who are for guns are for guns. that's the big difference. anyway, we're waiting for the president to take questions. he's expected at the lectern at 10:30. the first hundred days of his second term. there will be a lot of questions about how's he doing? we'll be right back after the break. girl vo: i'm pretty conservative. very logical thinker. (laughs) i'm telling you right now, the girl back at home would absolutely not have taken a zip line in the jungle. (screams)

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just over a minute to hear from the president. joining us right now for last-minute questioning of us, joanne reed. joanne, what would you ask the president right now? >> well, i think one of the questions obviously would be what kind of contact the united states had with the russian government prior to the bombings in boston, what kind of intelligence may have been missed. or what kind of failures he would point to in the runup to that. did we have any intelligence about these two brothers before that deadly peak. and in general, the relationship with the russians are important because of issues with syria and iran. what is our posture towards the russians? what is our cooperative stance toward them are they helpful to us in way. obviously, with syria, i'm very interested to hear his thinking on that. there are a lot of warhawks out there beating the drums on syria. and i was relieved that the president seemed to sound a note of caution that he walked back a

little bit from that red line statement from before. but where are we with syria. i think a lot of american, uncomfortable trying to take down known baathist in the civilization. >> i wonder what the russians want. they would join us in the fight for terrorism. and certainly they have a deal with islamists, the dangerous part. they have to deal with the fact that they're losing in syria, way back to the wocold war with the baathist regime as you mentioned. and now they may have to deal with the terrorists who may look like they have to take over in damascus. so we may face a lebanon-type situation. the russians have to take sides on that. this is going to be tricky. we have to pick sides, they have to pick sides.

we have to face the reality, the president of the united states after two months of not taking questions from the press. the last time he took questions in a formal set was two months ago. i suspect the questions are going to be about this topic of syria. after going to war in afghanistan and iraq. a troubling war there. and it's easy to say we'll deal with it standback weapons and somewhere we end up killing people. we may say we're not at war, but if we're killing people, we're at war. and making more enemies. this is my concern on national television. we wonder why we have a jihadist problem virally, it may be because we're always seen at war with the people troubled the most by that who believe we're the bad guys. that's a problem we have to deal with even though we are the good

guys. >> when barack obama was running for president he said he wasn't against the idea of wars, just dumb wars. the obviously noxious and toxic assad regime. the concern over what happened in boston, the viral idea that there is his islamist action out there. and this confirms that that this will speed the rush. i think the president has been smart when it comes to the arab spring about standing back a little bit about not having this giant american footprint all over the middle east. that presence there. our constant presence, military presence has not necessarily been helpful to change in those governments. i think there's something to be said for people throwing off their own dictators. there's something to be said for that in the pride of a nation

and development of a nation for people to be able do that themselves. i can understand where people want to step in. but i am very concerned that we rush into another war in the middle east. >> of course, the french gave us some help back in the 18th century. it's very helpful at a time. people like lafayette. anyway, let me ask you, let's go back to kristen welker about the president's stance on syria. >> right. well, cri shg, chris, one of th questions i would be looking out for is one of urgency. the president has said he's not prepared to make a decision on how to proceed with syria until he can corroborate, until there's corroboration of that intelligence that shows that chemical weapons were likely used in the country. i've been trying to pin down, well, when is his time line? when does he want an answer? administration officials say, look, we don't have a time line because we want to get it right. but the reality is there must abe sense of urgency given the fact that 70,000 people have been killed so far.

those are the latest estimates. so there must be some sense of urgency. i'll be looking to see if that comes through today when the president answers question. administration official, keenly aware of those polls you sited at the top that shows there some an appetite for what's happening for intervening. do people want to see the murdering there stop? yes. there, of course is not a huge appetite, the nation does seem to be war weary in drawing down iraq and afghanistan, chris. >> we have a few more minutes. it's slipping again. it's down to 10:34. >> we're used to the slippage, chris. look, i by no means am beating the drums of war. we cannot lose sight of the massacre that's happening in syria. to my dear friend joy reid, i

would say this is not about shaking off the yoke of a radre. there are 7 years on their way to school assassinated. hands tied behind their backs and sent down the river. we haven't done a particularly good job of covering what is happening in syria. it is a disaster so in some ways we can rationalize this by looking at the poll numbers and saying there's no appetite for it. but let us not forget what is really happening on the ground over there. >> i think part of the solution may be the alouettes over there. i think the war will end when they decide to quit or cordoned themselves off as a separate part of that country. going back to the alouette home

where they can survive. they do not want to turn themselves over to the sunnis. there's for way in the world we can convince them to do that, submit themselves to justice to the side that hates them. joy-ann reid, that's the problem, if you ask a dictator to step down, he's not stepping down to go teach at a college. like zambia, i'd love for them to leave at the right time. get out of there, go somewhere and teach. but it doesn't work that way in these countries. there's a tremendous blood lust and to brutalize and get even. my argument would be why can't the russians accept a number of these people. or we somehow offer them some protection so we end the war. give them their little piece of syria. i'm not sure what the answer is, just bombing them into giving up i'm not sure offers the solution we're going to like. your thoughts, joy? >> i think what alex said is absolutely true. the brutality of what's

happening there has not been covered in the west. it hasn't elicited the sympathy because people do not know the facts there is no airlift that the russian, going to send in. they look at if you're the assad regime, you're looking to what happened in the other baathist regime, and moammar gadhafi and the end that they're come to. they are not planning to turn themselves over to the other side. assad is going to fight to the bitter end. the question is, do we know enough about the opposition to arm it. so far, the united states has said, no, we don't know enough to directly arm the militants on the other side. because we don't truly understand who the opposition is. i think if there was a credible alternative to put in and you can do what was done in haiti where you sort of bring out the old government. i just don't know that the united states has number one the credibility in the region to do

that or the intelligence or know enough about the other side to do that. it's really a frustrating situation, i think for those like alex. and she's absolutely right who are concerned about the humanitarian situation but it's a difficult thing to figure out what to do. would american troops on the ground make it better? i don't know. >> i'm talking about a deal here. we just talked about dzhokhar tsarnaev who has lawyered up in massachusetts. do you decide which person gets hanged first, his wife or him or his whole family or all get wiped out together. we know why this guy is fighting. he's fighting for the life of his own family, his own life. his people. he may not be able to cut a deal. why do we think through this to a solution that requires or allows the ending of the bloodshed, my thought, perhaps it's ideaistic, chris, i'd like to see this end without more

people being killed. >> i think that's right. what a lot of people are look, for it's president to address is this idea what do we do with assad. are we going to call the u.n. in. are we going to bring russia in as a partner and try to talk him down from the ledge. do we offer him -- does russia offer him, you know, some kind of place to go outside of syria that would be safe and he could be exiled but his family could be safe. i mean, there are a lost options at this point. and the president put force on the table when he said chemical weapons was the red line. and now, what everybody wants to know, what do you do? and kristen, one other thing that i wanted to point out that i think the president might get questions on is his grand bargain. remember, the debt ceiling that we had going forward expires in may. society idea what are we going to do, what is the president doing, is he working with congress. what does he want to see happen, is there any movement on that. is also a really important thing to watch, in addition to other

big issues like syria. >> chris, thanks for that. we're waiting for the press to take questions. he's a little delayed right now. he's expected to get to the lectern. i expect a fireup in that room with the president. [ male announcer ] straight from red lobster's chefs to your table for a limited time! it's our seafood dinner for two for just 25 dollars! a handcrafted seafood feast made to share. first you each get salad

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and that's about to become an issue for me. ♪ and if you got the wrong home insurance coverage, my medical bills could get expensive. so get allstate. [ dennis ] good hands. good home. make sure you have the right home protection. talk to an allstate agent. with me still waiting for the president to begin its press conference. nbc's kristen welker, joy-ann reid. and chris frates of the national journal. i have to ask you, chris, about trade craft. when reporters get a chance to ask the president on national television, do they ever do an audible, do they say i have to

do a follow-up? or do they go with what they planned to ask? >> no, i think the follow-up question is incredibly important in a setting like this, chris. i think it's actually something that reporters think about going into a press conference. in other words, you might have your first question. and then anticipate him to not directly answer it which would come as no surprise to you, of course. so i think that that's an important part of this type of exchange. and going back to your point, right before we went to break, i think you're going to hear a lot of questions about that red line. you're going to hear reporters really press him on those words that he used about the red line in syria. and i want to make one more point on that front, chris. i think the importance of russia here in this equation can't be understated. we've been talking about whether or not this administration will intervene in syria. i think part of what they're doing right now is trying to buy themselves a little bit of time so they can get russia to esse

convince assad to step down or to leave. i think that is kind of the best case scenario for the united states and going back to the points that you all have been making. it certainly is a humanitarian crisis. united states knows that something needs to be done and i hope that russia can be the key here. >> negotiating partner on the zealots side that can say okay he can leave? >> that's certainly one of the options. of course, the opposition forces sorry complicated, chris, because it's not clear who all of the opposition forces are comprised of. it's thought that some of them have links to al qaeda. one of the options bandied about is arming the rebels. why haven't they done that yet? because it's not clear who all the opposition forces are. so that certainly another path that the united states is considering as it figures out

how to proceed with syria. >> you know, alex, i think we're going to be talking about this for months. i don't think it's a quick ending unless there's an ingenious diplomatic delusio ii. and how much power is there without killing civilians. that's something they have to be careful about, adding bloodshed in a civilian community by using weapons that perhaps aren't accurate enough to just kill military installations. here he is. good morning, everybody. i am hear to answer questions in honor of ed henry, as he wraps up his tenure as president of the white house correspondents association. ed, because of that, you get the first question. congratulations.

>> thank you. i appreciate that. and i hope to go back to business. you can't be mad at me. >> i'm not. >> a couple questions on national security. on syria, you said that the red line was not just about chemical weapons being used but being spread. and it was a game-changer, it seemed cut and dried. and now your administration seems to be suggesting that line is not clear. do you risk u.s. credibility if you don't take military action? and then on benghazi, there are some survivors of that terror attack who say they want to come forward and testify. some in your state department, and they say they've been blocked. will you allow them to testify? >> well, first of all, on syria i think it's important to understand that for several years now, what we've been seeing as a slowly-unfolding disaster for the syrian people. and this is not a situation in which we've been simply bystanders to what's been

happening. my policy from the beginning has been that president assad had lost credibility, that he attacked his own people. has killed his own people. unleashed a military against innocent civilians. and that the only way to bring stability and peace to syria is going to be for assad to step down and to move forward on a political transition. in pursuit of that strategy we've organized the national community. we are the largest humanitarian donor. we have worked to strengthen the opposition. we have provided nonlethal assistance to the opposition. we have applied sanctions on syria. so, there are a whole host of steps that we've been taking, precisely because, even separate from the chemical weapons issue, what's happening in syria is a blemish on the international community in general. and we've got to make sure that we're doing everything we can to protect the syrian people.

in that context, what i've also said is that the use of chemical weapons would be a game-changer. not simply for the united states, but for the international community. and the reason for that is we have established national law and international norms that say when you use these kinds of weapons, you have the potential of killing massive number of people in the most inhumane way possible. and the proliferation risks sorry significant that we don't want that genie out of the bottle. so when i said that the use of chemical weapons would be a game-changer, that wasn't unique to -- that wasn't a position unique to the united states. and it shouldn't have been a surprise. and what we now have is evidence that chemical weapons have been used inside of syria, but we don't know how they were used, when they were used.

who used them. we don't have a chain of custody that establishes what exactly happened. and when i am making decisions about america's national security and the potential for taking additional action, in response to chemical weapon use, i've got to make sure i've got the facts. that's what the american people would expect. and if we end up rushing to judgment without hard effective, evidence, then we can find ourselves in a position where we can't mobilize the international community to support what we do. there may be objections even among some people in the region who are sympathetic with the opposition if we take action. so, it's important for us to do this in a prudent way. and what i've said to my team is we've got to do everything we

can to investigate and establish with some certainty what exactly has happened in syria. what is happening in syria. we will use all the assets and resources we have at our disposal. we'll work with the neighbors countries to see whether we can establish a clear baseline of facts. and we've also called on the united nations to investigate. but the important point i want to make here is that we already are deeply engaged in trying to bring about a solution in syria. it is a difficult problem. but even if chemical weapons were not being used in syria, we'd still be thinking about tens of house to of people, innocent civilians, women, children, who have been killed by a regime that's more concerned about staying in power than it is about the well-being of its people. and so we are already deeped invested in trying to find a

solution here. what is true, though, is, if i can establish in a way that not only the united states, but also the international community feel confident is the use of chemical weapons by the assad regime, then that is a game-changer, because what that portends is potentially even more devastating attacks on civilians. and it raises the strong possibility that those chemical weapons can fall into the wrong hands and get disseminated in ways that would threaten u.s. security or the security of our allies. >> you mean u.s. military action? >> by game-changer, i mean that we would have to rethink the range of options that are available to us. now, we're already, as i said, invested, in trying to bring back a solution inside of syria.

obviously, there are options that are available to me that are on the shelf right now. but we have not, and that's a spectrum of options. and as early as last year, i asked the pentagon, our military, our intelligence, officials to prepare for me what options might be available. and i won't go into the details what those options might be. but, you know, clearly, that would be an escalation in our view, of the threat to the security of the international community. our allies and the united states and that means that there's some options that we might not otherwise exercise that we wo d would -- that we would strongly consider. >> and on the benghazi question, i know pieces of story have been litigated, even been asked about it. but there are people in your own state department saying they've been blocked in coming forward. that they survived the terror

attack and they want to tell their story, will you help them come forward and just say it once and for all? >> ed, i'm not familiar with this notion that anybody has been blocked from testifying. what i'll do, i'll find out what exactly you're referring to. what i've been been very clear about from the start that our job with respect to benghazi has been to find out exactly what happened. to make sure that u.s. embassies, not just in the middle east, but around the world, are safe and secure. and to bring those who carried it out to justice. but i'll find out what exactly you're referring to. >> they've hired an attorney because they're saying they've been blocked from coming forward >> i'm not familiar with it. jessica. >> mr. president, there's a report that your director of national intelligence has delivered a broad review. this is in regards to the boston bombing. that your dni has offered a broad review of your intelligence gathering prior to

the attack. there's also a series of senators, saxby chambliss, lindsey graham that after all these years of 9/11, there wasn't enough intelligence shared. and lindsey graham has said that benghazi and boston are examples of going backwards for the u.s. on national security. is he right or did our intelligence miss something? >> no, mr. graham is not right on this issue. although i'm sure it generated some headlines. i think what we saw in boston was state, local, federal officials, every agency, rallying around a city that had been attacked. identifying the perpetrators just hours after the scene had been examined. we now have one individual

deceased, one in custody. charges have been brought. i think that all our law enforcement officials performed in an exemplary fashion after the bombing had taken place. and we should be be very proud of their work, as obviously, we're proud of the people in boston, all the first responders and the medical personnel that helped save lives. what we also know is that the russian intelligence services had alerted u.s. intelligence about the older brother, as well as the mother, indicating that they might be simple ympathizer extremists. the fbi investigated that older brother. it's not as if the fbi did nothing. they not only investigated the older brother, they interviewed the older brother. they concluded there were no

signs that he was engaging in extremist activity. so that much, we know. and the question then was was there something that happened that triggered radicalization and actual decision by the brother are to engage in the attack that we have -- the tragic attack we actually saw in boston. and are there things -- additional things that could have been done in that interim that might have prevented it. now, what director clapper is doing is standard procedure around here which is when an event like this happens, we want to go back and we want to review every step that was taken. we want to leave no stone unturned. we want to see, is there in fact additional protocols and procedures that could be put in place that would further improve and enhance our ability to detect a potential attack. and we won't know that until

that review is completed. we won't know that until the investigation, the actual crime is fully completed. and that's still ongoing. but what i can say is, based on what i've seen so far, the fbi performed its duties. the department of homeland security did what it was supposed to be doing. but this is hard stuff. and i've said for quite some time, that because of the pressure that we put on al qaeda court, because of pressure we put on these networks that are well financed and more sophisticated and can engage and project transnational threats against the united states, one of the dangers that we now face are self-radicalized individuals

who are already here in the united states, in some cases, may not be part of any kind of network. but because of whatever warped, twisted ideas they may have may decide to carry out an attack. and those are in some ways more difficult to prevent. so what i've done for months now is to indicate to our entire counterterrorism team what more can we do on that club that is looming on the horizon? are there more things that we can do, whether it's engaging in -- engaging with communities where there's a potential for self-radicalization of this sort? is there work that can be done in terms of detection? but all of this has to be done in the context of our laws. due process.

and so, part of what director clapper is doing then is going to see if we can determine any lessons learned from what happened. >> are you getting all the intelligence and information you need from the russians? and should americans be worried when they go to the big public events now? >> the russians have been very cooperative with us. since the boston bombing. obviously, old habits die hard. there's still suspicions sometimes between intelligence and law enforcement agencies that date back 10, 20, 30 years. back to the cold war. but they're continually improving. i've spoken to president putin directly. he's committed to working with me to make sure that those who report to us are cooperating fully. in not only this investigation, but how